Figuring Out the Stuff Between the Beginning and the End

The Two for One Special

Believe it or not, there was once a time when I liked chocolate. Now, I’ve never really had an overactive sweet tooth. More often than not, Halloween candy would sit in my closet to be thrown away a few weeks later the next year (like I ever cleaned out my closet). But I did enjoy the occasional slice of chocolate cream pie from the KDub (that’s K&W for those not in the know). I also liked to have a Kit Kat or Twix every now and then.

And that’s where we begin our story. With a Twix bar.

In those chocolate eating younger years, the Twix was probably my favorite candy bar. Chocolate and caramel with a cookie crunch. Not too shabby. And you got two of them. Pretty sweet deal if you ask me.

I’m not too sure how old I was when this story takes place. It was around that age when the baby molars are ready to fall out to make room for the permanent molars. See where this is going yet?

I was sitting in my room, eating a delicious caramel Twix bar. Suddenly I felt a strange sensation near the back of my mouth. One of those molars had gotten stuck in the caramel and popped out of the bottom gum. I spit the tooth out of my mouth, cleaned it off and got it ready for a visit from the tooth fairy that night.

I remember thinking it was odd that the tooth had come out. In the days leading to the Twix incident, the tooth had not felt loose. There was no wiggling. So I thought nothing more of the strange occurrence and continued eating my candy bar.

Then it happened. The molar on the opposite side of my mouth got stuck in the caramel and popped out, just like its twin had done only a few minutes earlier. Again, I cleaned off the chocolate and caramel, facing the reality of becoming two dollars richer, rather than just one.

I wasn’t traumatized by losing two teeth on the same candy bar, and this isn’t the story of how I came to hate chocolate. But I did make the decision to throw the rest of that Twix away that afternoon. Why take unnecessary chances?